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No Use for Donk Twits
Good use of all our forces and their expertise.
We have celebrated the courageous soldiers, airmen, and Marines who fight to secure Iraq and help establish democracy and stability for the Iraqis, but few know of the on-the-ground commitment of the Navy. When our troops find IEDs, they often turn to the Sand Sailors — electronic-warfare specialists who teach the troops how to keep terrorists from activating their bombs:
We have celebrated the courageous soldiers, airmen, and Marines who fight to secure Iraq and help establish democracy and stability for the Iraqis, but few know of the on-the-ground commitment of the Navy. When our troops find IEDs, they often turn to the Sand Sailors — electronic-warfare specialists who teach the troops how to keep terrorists from activating their bombs:
Navy Lt. Mark Dye hadn’t seen combat before a helicopter dropped him at the deadliest forward operating base for roadside bomb attacks in northern Iraq with an urgent task.
Improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, had killed 22 soldiers from the 101st Airborne at Forward Operating Base McHenry in the past seven months. Other Army units were suffering similar casualties in May 2006 and it was getting worse. Troops were finding an average of 18 roadside bombs a day.
Dye and 300 other shipboard electronic warfare specialists were charged with teaching troops how to defuse the bombs by jamming the electronic signals the insurgents used to detonate them.
“They called on a Wednesday and told me I was leaving (for Iraq) on Saturday,” said Dye, 38, who had spent his career on ships. “It was the right decision. Electronic warfare was our background, what we did it for a living.”
They called themselves “sand sailors,” and they did their job well by reducing IED fatalities at their bases. Monthly U.S. troop deaths from IEDs have dropped since reaching a high of 90 in May to 17 last month, in part because of their efforts, the military said in awarding Bronze Stars to Dye and others.
The Sand Sailors
Improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, had killed 22 soldiers from the 101st Airborne at Forward Operating Base McHenry in the past seven months. Other Army units were suffering similar casualties in May 2006 and it was getting worse. Troops were finding an average of 18 roadside bombs a day.
Dye and 300 other shipboard electronic warfare specialists were charged with teaching troops how to defuse the bombs by jamming the electronic signals the insurgents used to detonate them.
“They called on a Wednesday and told me I was leaving (for Iraq) on Saturday,” said Dye, 38, who had spent his career on ships. “It was the right decision. Electronic warfare was our background, what we did it for a living.”
They called themselves “sand sailors,” and they did their job well by reducing IED fatalities at their bases. Monthly U.S. troop deaths from IEDs have dropped since reaching a high of 90 in May to 17 last month, in part because of their efforts, the military said in awarding Bronze Stars to Dye and others.
The Sand Sailors
For the Navy.